NPE (Negative Play Experience) in Age of Sigmar

[Dingding123]

Def. agree on save stacking needing to go.  Save bonuses are something that only specific subfactions and the odd hero warscroll should benefit from.  Stuff like Grots having an effective 3+ save against Archaon the Everchosen because a Fungoid Cave-Shaman had a magical sneeze and then yelled at them makes very little thematic sense.  If anything AoS may as well modify wound rolls instead since they can't be stacked against rend, like why not?  How are wound rolls more sacred than saves this many updates in?

As long as All-Out Attack exists in its current state, though, All-Out Defence should also exist in some form, if not its current one.

[JackOfBlades]

5 minutes ago, Dingding123 said:

Def. agree on save stacking needing to go.  Save bonuses are something that only specific subfactions and the odd hero warscroll should benefit from.  Stuff like Grots having an effective 3+ save against Archaon the Everchosen because a Fungoid Cave-Shaman had a magical sneeze and then yelled at them makes very little thematic sense.

As far as i can see the best save that stabbas can have is a 5+. Am i missing some combo? Or did you mean that the combo is to modify the save by +3, and thus negate Archaon's rend?

Edited June 26, 2022 by JackOfBlades

[Dingding123]

Naturally Grots have a 6+ save.

Warscroll shields give them 5+ vs. melee

Mystic Shield an effective 4+ vs 1 rend

All-Out Defence effective  3+ vs 2 rend

 

[Fairbanks]

1 hour ago, Dingding123 said:

 How are wound rolls more sacred than saves this many updates in?

In a game representing war, things should die, in many ways and as often as possible.

[Malakree]

1 hour ago, Dingding123 said:

Naturally Grots have a 6+ save.

Warscroll shields give them 5+ vs. melee

Mystic Shield an effective 4+ vs 1 rend

All-Out Defence effective  3+ vs 2 rend

 

Saying "effective save" in the way you do is wildly misleading.

5+ ignoring 2 rend is world's away from 3+. That nomenclature only works with things which can actually have a 2+ save.

[Dingding123]

3 hours ago, Malakree said:

+ ignoring 2 rend is world's away from 3+. That nomenclature only works with things which can actually have a 2+ save.

Read this wrong, delete

Edited June 26, 2022 by Dingding123

[Malakree]

1 minute ago, Dingding123 said:

Is it, in a day and age where SoB exist?

I don't understand your point. Most units are not rocking -3 rend, they are a tiny portion.

A 5+ ignoring 3 rend is a 5+ vs no rend.
A 2+ is a 2+ vs no rend.

They are worlds apart.

[JackStreicher]

On 6/25/2022 at 9:22 AM, Gokken said:

save stacking: because it jacks up the value for mortal wounds so insanely much rend 0 and 1 attacks need 6 attacks to score one damage where as mortals on 4+ or 5+ need 2 or 3 attacks. You would need 110 attacks to hurt a maw crusher on a 2+ save........ 

ruins almost any game for me. It‘s unequally distributed amongst armies, has a way too high impact on survivability and it creates feel bad moments the same way Mortal wounds do. The whole save stacking mechanic isn’t thought through at all.

[Enoby]

1 hour ago, JackStreicher said:

ruins almost any game for me. It‘s unequally distributed amongst armies, has a way too high impact on survivability and it creates feel bad moments the same way Mortal wounds do. The whole save stacking mechanic isn’t thought through at all.

I do think that lethality needed to come down in AoS from AoS 2 - in that, it felt like units just disintegrated to whoever attacked first which also sucked. However the problem with save stacking is that the most lethal models are also the tankiest - the mawkrusha wouldn't be seen anywhere as much if it was just 15 wounds on a 3+ save with bad attacks. It's the fact that its very tanky and can destroy pretty much anything that makes it so strong - you can't safely countercharge it. 

I personally like weaker models (4+ save and worse) being able to up their saves and make themselves immune to rend to give them staying power. I don't like 3+ save cabbages of death with the ability to heal only being vulnerable to mortal wounds and rolling 1s. 

I think it may have been a good idea if they tried to balance tankyness and damage together more - if something does super high damage, don't make it impossible to kill by making 4+ saves more common (or at least make it unique and cost half your army). 

[JackStreicher]

7 hours ago, Enoby said:

I do think that lethality needed to come down in AoS from AoS 2 - in that, it felt like units just disintegrated to whoever attacked first which also sucked. However the problem with save stacking is that the most lethal models are also the tankiest - the mawkrusha wouldn't be seen anywhere as much if it was just 15 wounds on a 3+ save with bad attacks. It's the fact that its very tanky and can destroy pretty much anything that makes it so strong - you can't safely countercharge it. 

I personally like weaker models (4+ save and worse) being able to up their saves and make themselves immune to rend to give them staying power. I don't like 3+ save cabbages of death with the ability to heal only being vulnerable to mortal wounds and rolling 1s. 

I think it may have been a good idea if they tried to balance tankyness and damage together more - if something does super high damage, don't make it impossible to kill by making 4+ saves more common (or at least make it unique and cost half your army). 

Maybe a 40k-esque solution would work: Save stacking for Battleline only. It would not fix all the issues but would stop the immortal heroes hammer.

[Beliman]

9 hours ago, JackStreicher said:

It‘s unequally distributed amongst armies

100% this.

[Caution: wall of text]

But I want to point out that maybe the problem is more rooted in AoS than at first glance. The main tools that AoS has to remove enemy models are Wounds and Mortal Wounds.

And AoS 3.0 has a save stacking mechanic that we can split Wounds in two categories: High Rend and Low rend. I don't know were to mark the line between this two, but it's not important for what I'm trying to say.
Then we have Mortal Wounds. But IMO, there are some holes in that design.

Let's look at their "perfect" target

And their "perfect" counter

The main structure is build around a pyramid (who has more blue arrows= good, who has more red arrows= bad), and that makes some things plain better than others. Nothing wrong with that, if it's equally distributed between armies. But that's not the case for AoS, instead, we haves some weird tools to normalize all this interactions:

• High number of wounds (models) can counter mortal wounds.
• +attacks and/or +damage buffs counter high number of wounds/models (anything basically).
• Mortal wounds are more limited than other type of wounds, but there are armies that can reliable generate a lot more than others
• Same for Ward Saves, some armies doesn't have any, but others can have 5+ for their basic units.
• Save stacking needs resources and a plan to do it, but some armies already have high number of tools to do that....
• ... unlike Rend, that only a few can generate "extra rend" buffs.

There are a lot more points that we can talk about, but what I'm tryng to say is that we are using a system that make some of them better than others and they are not equally distributed, and the tools to mitigate this "unbalance" are a lot more scattered around armies/buffs than it should.

Edited June 27, 2022 by Beliman

[Gailon]

Good discussion on how NPE =/= overpowered. Sometimes it's hard to feel this. Right now the competitive meta of AOS is impressively balanced. Lots of different armies hitting podiums with lots of different lists. But that just isn't the measure for NPE. I hadn't played Fangs of Sotek in awhile because they were OP in 2.0 for a bit. As they have fallen off a bit in the competitive scene I busted them back out, because now they are 'balanced.' 

They might be more balanced on the tournament scene, but they are full of NPE. A block of skinks with a pile of buffs that run and shoot and charge and then shoot when you charge them and run away. That list has high unbinds, alpha strike, mortal wound shooting, and their shoot and run away ability is just a 4+, which is at least random, but is much much harder to interact with than Unleash Hell. 

Losing 50% of the time doesn't mean it doesn't have a lot of NPE. 

Save Stacking

I will throw my hat in the ring as liking save stacking. At least liking it a lot more than just not having it. It's partially about survivability, but also about matchups. Mystic shield goes in one place, all out defense is one place, finest hour is declared in the hero phase. 

It is kind of weird that Durthu can bounce off some infantry because they have mystic shield in cover with all out defense. But I like having high consequences for a poor matchup, not just x always beats y, but x shouldn't attack y *in this specific circumstance on the table this turn.* 

It really allows you to use units and counter damage and create opportunity costs or inefficiencies. 

My problem is that this doesn't work very well in a high point cost monster/hero hammer. I can talk about screens and matchups and such, but they have pointed the game in a way that makes it very difficult to run a tactical mixed force. Much better to have two maw krushas smashing around the table. 

I just don't think it's the fault of save stacking. Archeon shouldn't be attacking grots when they have +3 to their save, he should be going somewhere else. Spread out your damage, force the use of CP attack weakpoints and try to put strong ones forward. 

I just feel like save stacking has very strong potential to add a tactical element, but there are other things that make it difficult to engage with those tactics. 

[zilberfrid]

18 minutes ago, Gailon said:

Good discussion on how NPE =/= overpowered. Sometimes it's hard to feel this. Right now the competitive meta of AOS is impressively balanced. Lots of different armies hitting podiums with lots of different lists. But that just isn't the measure for NPE. I hadn't played Fangs of Sotek in awhile because they were OP in 2.0 for a bit. As they have fallen off a bit in the competitive scene I busted them back out, because now they are 'balanced.' 

They might be more balanced on the tournament scene, but they are full of NPE. A block of skinks with a pile of buffs that run and shoot and charge and then shoot when you charge them and run away. That list has high unbinds, alpha strike, mortal wound shooting, and their shoot and run away ability is just a 4+, which is at least random, but is much much harder to interact with than Unleash Hell. 

Losing 50% of the time doesn't mean it doesn't have a lot of NPE. 

Save Stacking

I will throw my hat in the ring as liking save stacking. At least liking it a lot more than just not having it. It's partially about survivability, but also about matchups. Mystic shield goes in one place, all out defense is one place, finest hour is declared in the hero phase. 

It is kind of weird that Durthu can bounce off some infantry because they have mystic shield in cover with all out defense. But I like having high consequences for a poor matchup, not just x always beats y, but x shouldn't attack y *in this specific circumstance on the table this turn.* 

It really allows you to use units and counter damage and create opportunity costs or inefficiencies. 

My problem is that this doesn't work very well in a high point cost monster/hero hammer. I can talk about screens and matchups and such, but they have pointed the game in a way that makes it very difficult to run a tactical mixed force. Much better to have two maw krushas smashing around the table. 

I just don't think it's the fault of save stacking. Archeon shouldn't be attacking grots when they have +3 to their save, he should be going somewhere else. Spread out your damage, force the use of CP attack weakpoints and try to put strong ones forward. 

I just feel like save stacking has very strong potential to add a tactical element, but there are other things that make it difficult to engage with those tactics. 

The problem with save stacking is that mortal wounds are not equally distributed. Rend is almost dead this edition, so they could just call it the "era of the mortal wound" and be more accurate.

[KrispyXIV]

1 hour ago, zilberfrid said:

The problem with save stacking is that mortal wounds are not equally distributed. Rend is almost dead this edition, so they could just call it the "era of the mortal wound" and be more accurate.

I find it odd that rend isn't super valuable some folks.  I get a lot of mileage even out of rend 1 - even if that's causing my opponent to spend resources negating it, but generally by applying it either where they didn't buff or where they don't want to.  

There's a whole lot of it not being useful in theory, but in practice I find it applying all over the place.

[NinthMusketeer]

Here's a fresh negative play experience: when kruelboyz players compare what 90 points of gutrippaz do compared to 105 points of spite revenants.

Edited June 28, 2022 by NinthMusketeer

[Dingding123]

I'm still of the thought that save bonuses specifically shouldn't be as readily available at little cost as they are now.  Why is there no downside for such a braindead CA as All-Out Defence, like -1 to hit+wound until the end of the phase or to one of those until the end of the battle round?  And between Finest Hour and Mystic Shield one of them should have nothing to do with saves; perhaps a 6+ ward for heroes/units without one and a +1 ward bonus otherwise, with a hard cap at 4+ wards or so. 

I bought most of my models during late 2.0 and was thoroughly disappointed when they turned out to be much worse off vs. 3.0's sheer save-stacking.  It's not an example of first-hand NPE though, as 3.0 strayed me away from tournaments altogether (as did covid, granted) until now.  Still, I'd have been hard-pressed to score decently with what I had bought and spent time putting together let alone win at all, and the NPE's would have fallen upon any of my well-mannered opponents from stomping me so hard if not myself from embarrassment.

[zilberfrid]

6 hours ago, KrispyXIV said:

I find it odd that rend isn't super valuable some folks.  I get a lot of mileage even out of rend 1 - even if that's causing my opponent to spend resources negating it, but generally by applying it either where they didn't buff or where they don't want to.  

There's a whole lot of it not being useful in theory, but in practice I find it applying all over the place.

The problem is that GW seems to value high rend higher than mortal wounds somehow.

High rend also really doesn't do what it used to. I agree that rend -1 is still as useful as it was, but -2 and -3 have lost quite a bit of value.

Edited June 28, 2022 by zilberfrid

[yukishiro1]

The fundamental problem is baked into the system. Going from a 3+ to 2+ is too much of a damage reduction compared with going from a 4+ to a 3+. It always has been and it always will be. 2+ saves simply shouldn't be achievable except in exceptional circumstances. 

The rule should always have been that you can't get better than a 3+ save unless you have better than a 3+ save naturally. The issues with save stacking go away at that point, and if save stacking isn't so valuable any more, people stop doing it so much, which means the issue with rend values being mitigated by it largely go away as well. The prize of the 2+ save is just too large and it distorts the whole game. 

Edited June 28, 2022 by yukishiro1

[JackStreicher]

I had a BnB game VS Skaven today.

By the start of turn two I had lost 76,667% of my models due to unnecessary mortal wound spam (no hit or wound roll required).

I am drawing the line here and quitting the hobby. It’s too expensive and time-consuming for me to persue any further while it feels like all I do nowadays is face off against insane bs and bad game design decisions.

I wish all comp. gamers well, you‘ll manage and be fine. For all the other player groups: I am not so sure if you will be fine anymore.

Goodbye guys

 

Edited June 28, 2022 by JackStreicher

[zilberfrid]

54 minutes ago, JackStreicher said:

I had a BnB game VS Skaven today.

By the start of turn two I had lost 76,667% of my models due to unnecessary mortal wound spam (no hit or wound roll required).

I am drawing the line here and quitting the hobby. It’s too expensive and time-consuming for me to persue any further while it feels like all I do nowadays is face off against insane bs and bad game design decisions.

I wish all comp. gamers well, you‘ll manage and be fine. For all the other player groups: I am not so sure if you will be fine anymore.

Goodbye guys

Check in every once in a while. The models work perfectly for other games, and GW is good at making beautiful and creative designs (though they also make space marines).

Maybe they learn how to make a good game next edition, but I think the models and people are worth sticking around in TGA.

[pnkdth]

16 hours ago, JackStreicher said:

I had a BnB game VS Skaven today.

By the start of turn two I had lost 76,667% of my models due to unnecessary mortal wound spam (no hit or wound roll required).

I am drawing the line here and quitting the hobby. It’s too expensive and time-consuming for me to persue any further while it feels like all I do nowadays is face off against insane bs and bad game design decisions.

I wish all comp. gamers well, you‘ll manage and be fine. For all the other player groups: I am not so sure if you will be fine anymore.

Goodbye guys

 

I recommend exploring other tabletop games on a skirmish level (or standalone games). Like @zilberfrid says, you can just use your AoS stuff as proxies. Some systems are model agnostic too. I haven't met anyone who minds me using GW stuff either as long as I make an appropriate kitbash/sculpt. Most are likely just going to be happy you're interested in their game.

Only having 15 or less models to worry about really cuts back on the pressure to get things done. Malifaux, for example, is fun and most people will won't mind proxies which is nice because you're able to dip your toes into the game before committing to a play style you don't like. Their rules are 100% free and have an amazing app.

Another way to get others excited, and the ball rolling, is to ask around if anyone has a game they'd like to try. The hobby is so much bigger than GW.

[NinthMusketeer]

On 6/27/2022 at 10:53 PM, zilberfrid said:

The problem is that GW seems to value high rend higher than mortal wounds somehow.

High rend also really doesn't do what it used to. I agree that rend -1 is still as useful as it was, but -2 and -3 have lost quite a bit of value.

It remains absolutely ridiculous that units dealing MWs are more common than units with rend -2.

[novakai]

MW are also facilitating more Ward saves now too, which also hurts rend and regular attacks since Ward units can possible get 2 chances to negate damage with save stacking (a little less if the weapon does multi damage) while MW only need to worry about the Ward saves

if GW is going through their usually arm race mentality we could possibly see more anti ward ability like Drakkfoot and that NH dreadscythe Harridan allegiance in the future.

[zilberfrid]

15 minutes ago, novakai said:

MW are also facilitating more Ward saves now too, which also hurts rend and regular attacks since Ward units can possible get 2 chances to negate damage with save stacking (a little less if the weapon does multi damage) while MW only need to worry about the Ward saves

if GW is going through their usually arm race mentality we could possibly see more anti ward ability like Drakkfoot and that NH dreadscythe Harridan allegiance in the future.

They could give the scale something Aqshi artifact ability to most units. Start off with a ward save 4+ vs mortal wounds for all dwarves to signify their magic resistance, and go from there.

Mortal Wound spam fixed, but another layer of complexity.

[Fert]

A lot of this game is rock paper scissors.  At the competitive level the top tables players build lists that have the tools and make the right choices to deal with tough matchups.  Leverage low rend into hordes.  Leverage mortals into tough heroes.  Do the math on chance of success before you move into position only to whiff.  Have options baked into your list assist to deal with save stackers.. even if this means avoiding them.  Use control, use screens, use terrain, and/or movement.  You don't have to kill/smash/maim everything.  

Overall I feel that at competitive events people need to understand what they are signing up for.  You will play NPE games.  That's how it is.

For casual play, you need have the correct play group to avoid NPE.  Play path to glory.  Drink, laugh, have fun.  Read your friends reaction to the game.  If they have a bad time and quit... then your done playing as well.